There has been a fair amount of recent news regarding cement shortage and its affect on construction in the United States. The shortage appears to be throughout the US with the exception of the Great Lakes region. I know that in the great lakes almost all of the cemnt is shipped by boat from the cement producing plants to terminals around the lakes. Of the two plants I’m most familiar with: The St. Mary’s Cement plant in Charlevoix, MI has know rail connection and the LaFarge plant in Alpena, MI ships a limited amount by rail. I wonder how much cement is still shipped by rail and are there any transshipment facilities, possibly in the Chicago or Cleveland areas to ship cement by rail to Florida, Texas and California where the gratest shortages are occuring?
There is Blue Circle in Baltimore that gets it from ship.
Yes but a ship or a barge is limited to water.
LaFarge operates a former Blue Circle facility at Sparrows Point, Md where they receive cement by barge and blend it with ground up blast furnace slag and ship it out primarily by truck. There are covered hoppers with Blue Circle reporting marks but I don’t know if they are shipping finished product or receiving cement in these cars.
Holnam Cement’s plants here in Colorado just expanded to ship more concrete by rail. The hold-up here for years was inefficient plants. That is about to change.
Here in Manitowoc, WI St. Mary’s has large silos along the river where they receive cement by boat and then ship it out by truck. They used to ship some by rail using small covered hoppers but haven’t done that for years although the tracks are still in place alongside the storage silos.
Lafarge also has a plant north of paulding ohio(cecil) to be exact.ns still switches out this line.
stay safe
Joe
LaFarge a couple years ago finished a new plant in Sugercreek MO that is adjacent to another plant and on the property of a deep mine. Rock is mined and blended into concrete and either shipped by barge down the Missouri or loaded into railcars, the loading facility is on the transcon and is switched by the BNSF out of Murray yard. At the time LaFarge touted it as the most advanced plant in their system. I also know that many of the barges are headed for the Mississippi river and eventually the gulf coast.
Lonestar Cement in Oglesby, IL ships a few loads of cement by rail a month. they bought the 3 or so miles of the old IC ‘charter line’ between oglesby and la salle, IL to connect with the CSX (ex-Rock). there are a lot of old cement plants in this area and that’s the problem…they’re all well over 100 years old and i’m sure the capacity isn’t there to keep up with demand…
I read somewhere where that this country imports 25% of its cement and even then, we are in competition with China for the cement and the ships to carry it.
It is my understanding that several things caused the cement shortage. I work for a ready-mix concrete company in the Washington D.C area and I can tell you that it is a concern.
The first is that China and India are consuming huge amount of cement for the concrete in the massive public works projects that both countries are currently building, and are buying as much cement as possible on the world markets.
The second lesser know reason is that the U.S goverment now requires ships hauling cement into U.S. ports to have double hulls, like oil tankers do. Most of the smaller ships that have traditionaly brought inexpensive cement from Mexico and South America can no longer call on US ports. The effect has been both to reduce supply and increase the price.
Years ago virtually every concrete company received is cement by rail, either as bulk powder in cover hoppers or in 94 pound bags in boxcars. Today most concrete plants receive their cement by tractor trailer. What is shipped by rail is in covered hoppers from one cement manufacturing plant to another (to move either surplus supplies or specialty materials, since most cement manufacturing facilities also function as transloading terminals to trucks).
In my area both of the Essroc cement plants in Lime Kiln, MD (outside of Frederick), and in Martinsburg, WV can both receive and ship by rail, both are served by CSX. The Lehigh Cement plant in Union Bridge, MD. is currently under expansion to become the largest cement manufacturing plant on the east coast and I understand that it is planning to expand their use of rail. The plant on the formenr Western Maryland Ry. main line is now served by shortline Maryland Midland. Among the improvements at the upgraded plant is a new rail terminal and spur.
Me ex neighbor is a steel worker and he says that along with concrete, China and India are consuming large amounts of steel sending prices skyward. Has anyone priced nails and screws lately?
In Northern Nevada on Union Pacific’s “Overland Route” there are two facilities that handle bulk cement. One is a terminal in Sparks, the other is a manufacturing plant.
The Calaveras Cement terminal was once located near the Sparks Nugget but was relocated to East Gregg St in Sparks during construction of the Pyramid Ave. I-80 interchange. Since the move to East Gregg Street the company has become apart of the Lehigh Southwest Cement Company. This outfit receives all its bulk product via the Union Pacific railroad and is serviced by the railroads yard job. There are usually 8 to 10 railcars at the terminal.
The next outfit is Nevada Cement, now a part of Eagle Materials, this plant is located on Union Pacific’s “Overland Route” at Fernley, Nevada. The plant has been in operation since 1965. Today it produces about 600,000 tons of cement a year. Much of its production that is not used locally is shipped by rail to its terminal in Sacramento, with a lesser amount going to a Eagle Materials cement terminal in Salt Lake City.
Nevada Cement is serviced by UP’s Lovelock Local called out of Sparks, NV. Besides outbound loads of bulk cement, it also receives inbound loads of coal for its two rotary kilns.
During planning for construction of this operation, a mine railroad was considered, however a truck haul from the mine is what was implimented. During the early to mid 1980s for about two years the company in conjunction with Southern Pacific operated a unit train of 50 cars to its Sacramento cement terminal.
Here are a couple of photos of the cars and the plant from that time.
Jim
California Portland Cement Company ships cement from its Mojave plant to its Stockton terminal via rail. They used to, and might still, ship it in unit trains although it has been awhile since I saw one of those. Since they were usually short, UP may have decided to just throw the cars into regular trains. Many times the unit trains would have a bunch of Paramount Petroleum asphalt tankcars on it, and sometimes other cars going from the Mojave area up north.
California Portland Cement Company also has plants in Colton, CA., Phoenix, AZ., and Rillito, AZ. I think they all ship by rail.
I know Calaveras Cement ships via rail from its Monolith (Tehachapi) plant.
There is a cement plant in Victorville, CA that has rail service. I am thinking it is Southwest Portland Cement Company but I am not sure.
I have also seen hopper cars with Salt River Materials Group logo and others with Cemex logo on them.
I’m not any kind of expert on this or anything else for that matter, but have learned that cement and concrete are not the same thing. Concrete is what you get when you mix cement with water and aggregates (crushed stone, sand and gravel).
Jim
Hmmm… Cement is cement!
There is a plant in Victorville, Ca and it’s current name is Cemex. It used to be Southwest Portland Cement, then Southdown Cement. There was a major upgrade to our plant 3 years ago in order to get in compliance with environmental issues as well as the capability to produce a larger amount.We load 40-50 railcars per day out of this facility and ship them via the BNSF to our terminals in Phoenix, Az., Sacramento and San Diego Ca… We also load 200-300 trucks per day for local shipments. Last year we produced over 3 million tons and shipped over 3 million tons. For the last 6 years, we have been selling cement faster than we can make it.
Living in upper part of lower Michigan we have a cement transfer facility in a little town called Elmira that has incoming cement by rail that is trucked to the various cement mixing plants in this part of the state. On occasion the rail cars have Canadian reporting markings so I assume that the product is being shipped up from Canada.
Also in the Bay City area cement is brought into another transfer facility where the product comes in by ship and is transferred over to mostly trucks but some rail cars are loaded.
I work the gate at aHanson’s Aggregate plant in San Diego. While admitting to a limited knowledge about the subject, I can say this: Hanson’s main product is rock. They move silver and gold over to a corner somewhere and get a broker for it,all they want is rock.
They truck powder in every day to make concrete of various grades. Last year half the plant was idle for weeks because of the china/india problem.When the barge finally came in every powder rig (semi’s,oval looking bottom dumps)in the business was in a mad scramble to the harbor to get a supply in to all the plants in this area. The rumor at that time was there was a similar problem with steel.
Jim is correct. Cement is one of the ingredients in concrete. It is the “glue” that binds the sand and aggregate to make concrete.
In simple terms, one can compare cement to flour. Flour is a dry powder. But when it is mixed with water and added to other ingredients, it makes dough, which when baked becomes bread.
Cement in its natural state is a dry powder. Mixing it with water creates a chemical exothermic reaction (one that gives off heat) that turns the cement into a “glue”. Thus, when mixed with water and added to the other ingredients, it makes a sloshy mixture which once “baked” (exothermic reaction) becomes concrete.
In summary, you eat bread, not flour. You build with concerte, not cement.
Janek